Ex-Mexican Official Arrested In U.S.

The brother of a top Mexican official killed last year was arrested at Newark International Airport for allegedly failing to declare $28,000 in currency.

Mario Ruiz Massieu, former Mexican deputy attorney general, was arrested Friday evening, Steve Duchesne, a U.S. Customs Service spokesman, said Saturday.

Duchesne said Ruiz Massieu, his wife and daughter were to board a flight to Madrid on a vacation when a routine inspection found Ruiz Massieu declared only $18,000 of the $46,000 in Mexican and U.S. currency he was carrying.

If convicted, Massieu could receive five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Ruiz Massieu’s brother, Jose Francisco Ruiz Massieu, was assassinated in September. He was the No. 2 figure in the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which has ruled Mexico since the 1920s.